The next event in a monthly lecture series hosted by the newly established Vermont Center on Behavior and Health brings Carl Hart, associate professor of psychology at Columbia University, to campus to speak on "Challenging Assumptions about Drugs."

The event, free and open to the public, takes place Tuesday, Jan. 21 at 1 p.m. in Davis Auditorium, Fletcher Allen Health Care.

A major focus of Hart’s research is to understand complex interactions between drugs of abuse and the neurobiology and environmental factors that mediate human behavior and physiology. Hart is a member of the National Advisory Council on Drug Abuse and on the board of directors of the College on Problems of Drug Dependence and the Drug Policy Alliance. His new book, High Price is a complex story of scientific achievement in the face of overwhelming odds; it also highlights that U.S. drug policy is based on many false assumptions, and the enforcement of such policies is racially biased.